


Scenes from a Very Bad Day

by china_shop



Category: White Collar
Genre: Crack, Everyone shrinks, Fic, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-10-24
Updated: 2010-10-24
Packaged: 2017-10-12 20:56:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,037
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/128990
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/china_shop/pseuds/china_shop
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Neal crawled out the two-inch gap. "How was I supposed to know he had a shrink ray aimed at—" He looked up and down the street. "—at the whole of midtown Manhattan?"</p>
            </blockquote>





	Scenes from a Very Bad Day

**1.**

"Dammit, Neal!" Peter found a dirty plastic spoon and a crumpled paper coffee cup in the gutter, hauled them over and used them as lever and fulcrum to pry the brim of Neal's hat from the ground. "If you had stuck to the plan—"

"Really, Peter?" Neal crawled out the two-inch gap. "How was I supposed to know he had a shrink ray aimed at—" He looked up and down the street. "—at the whole of midtown Manhattan?"

Neal was about the size of an animated Ken doll. All along the street, people stood in clusters, shouting and panicking, and not one of them was taller than a car tire. And the shrinkage wasn't uniform, either—Jones was nearly a third taller than Peter now, and Neal and Peter were eye to eye. Buildings loomed impossibly overhead and the ground was littered with seemingly gigantic objects that people had been carrying when the shrink ray hit—including Neal's hat.

Peter let the hat flop back to the ground, creating a draught that nearly swept them both off their feet. "If you'd stayed put like I told you—"

It probably wasn't fair to blame Neal for this, but he wanted to blame _someone_ , and Neal was closest to hand.

"I thought he just wanted the diamond because it's worth forty million dollars," said Neal, dusting himself down. He was obviously as chagrined as Peter was. "Now what?"

Diana was heading their way. She turned to let herself down the last step from the Museum of Natural History, which was only slightly shorter than she was, and then hurried over. "You okay, boss?"

"We're fine," said Peter. He checked with her that the team was all right, and then asked, "Do we know how widespread this is?"

"According to first reports, most of New York State is affected," said Diana. "Washington's sending in the National Guard." As always, Peter was impressed by how well she rolled with the punches.

Then her words sunk in. "Elizabeth," he said. Under normal emergency situations, he had complete faith in her ability to take care of herself, but no one could have prepared for this. Anything could have happened to her: she could be trapped under a tin of caviar or drowning in champagne. And Peter's cellphone, which had been in his pocket, was tiny and useless, even if hers was okay. But they all had loved ones out there, fending for themselves, and they all had a duty to maintain order and do their jobs. Peter made himself focus on the situation at hand. "Diana and Jones, you get the team together and start interviewing witnesses. Sorensen was just the courier. We need to know where he was heading, who he was working for, anything we can find out. Do we have computer access?"

Diana gave a half-shrug. "Some. It's a pretty laborious process when the keyboard's bigger than you are."

"Okay, well, do the best you can," said Peter. "Neal, you and I are—Neal? Where's Caffrey?"

 

 **2.**

Neal was running across the museum grounds toward Columbus Ave. He'd considered and quickly discarded the idea of trying to lasso a squirrel, and was heading for a toy store instead. He could requisition a car, check on Elizabeth and be back before Peter seriously started to worry about him. And the transport was sure to be useful if they didn't figure out how to reverse the shrinking straight away.

Neal stopped to catch his breath. A dash across the grounds had sounded easy, but he wasn't used to being less than a foot tall. The grass was springy and tiring to run on, and he had to skirt bushes and stones. Even tree roots made it harder going. He wondered if he could catch and steer a dog, but he was already about halfway, and at this stage it would probably be quicker to just keep going.

When he reached the toy store, another problem presented itself: he wasn't tall enough to activate the motion sensor on the door, even when he waved his hands above his head. Through the glass doors he could see children and babies the size of dolls, and frantic little parents arguing and trying to open the door from the inside.

Neal waved his arms again, but nothing happened. It was incredibly frustrating that, having spent a considerable proportion of his life avoiding tripping motion sensors, Neal was now thwarted by his inability to work one when he needed to.

He looked around and saw a long silk scarf, abandoned on the sidewalk—perhaps he could do something with that. He moved back and forward, letting it billow above his head, and the doors finally relented and slid open, releasing a crowd of anxious shoppers.

Inside, the air was thick with bubbles from a battery-powered bubble machine, and Neal didn't know if it was those or the scarf that had successfully opened the doors. It didn't matter.

All the shop assistants seemed to have vanished, so he didn't have to flash his tiny consultant's badge at anyone. He tucked two heavy packets of batteries under his arm from the display by the checkout counter, and went in search of the radio controlled vehicles.

He'd hoped to find something cool like a convertible, but most of the cars were too small for him, and they were all molded plastic, with no way to get inside. He settled for a lime green humvee that he could sit on top of, and spent ten precious minutes prying it out of its packaging and working the batteries into the remote and the vehicle itself. Then he took it for a hasty test drive around the store. He discovered that the relatively outsized remote was unwieldy, but if he grasped it between his knees, he could steer reasonably well, and that the Barbie aisle was a disaster zone—apparently some little girls had decided to try on every item in her wardrobe.

Neal left the glittery pink chaos behind him and headed for the door, which someone had thoughtfully jammed open with a Star Wars action figure.

Out on the road, it was relatively easy to get around: the sidewalks were crowded, but the normal-sized traffic was at a standstill, and Neal kept his head and remote control as low as possible and drove straight under the stationary cars.

Elizabeth's office was only half a dozen blocks away. He could do this!

 

 **3.**

"Is everyone okay in here?" Elizabeth poked her head around the open door of the restaurant next to her showroom/office. She'd spent half an hour calming the mother of the bride for the wedding she was planning, while applying first aid to Yvonne's leg and getting the bride and groom to clear away the broken champagne glasses before anyone else got hurt.

But now everything was under control at Burke Premiere Events, and it was time to check on their neighbors. Patrons were clustered in the restaurant foyer around an old man who'd apparently fainted, and a family of four were sitting on a table near the door, eating a chicken filo parcel with their hands. Everyone seemed oblivious to the shouts from the kitchen.

El hurried into the back to see if she could help. It was what Peter would do.

Inside the kitchen, a dozen foot-high chefs and kitchen hands were on the floor, struggling to wrangle a fire extinguisher three times their size, while flames billowed from the stove top. The air was full of the smell of charred food and spices. It was sweltering.

Teri the sous chef, who El knew, was standing on tiptoe on a stool, trying to turn off the gas, and a young guy—maybe the dishwasher—was backed into a corner by the fridge, crying and freaking out.

El took in the situation and went over to the young guy. "It's okay, honey," she said. "Calm down. You're the tallest person here. You need to calm down and go help Teri turn off the stove."

"C-c-c-c-c-" said the guy, waving his hands wildly.

"What's your name?" asked El, and then she turned to look where he was pointing, and almost jumped out of her skin. There was a full-sized apron lying crumpled on the ground, and nosing around the edge of it was a cockroach, which to El's new perspective looked about the size of Satchmo. It was ugly and alien and vicious-looking. El stepped back involuntarily. "Jesus!"

It was facing them, its long antenna twitching, and El could feel panic rise up in her too. The hair on the back of her neck prickled. For the first time in her life, she wished she carried a gun. Still, there was important, restaurant-saving work to be done. Peter wouldn't get distracted by a roach. El swallowed her horror and put her arm around the guy's shoulders.

"What's your name?"

The guy was sweaty and shaking, and El thought he might pass out, but he managed to say, "B-B-Bart."

"Good. It's going to be okay, Bart. Trust me. It's going to be fine." She looked across the kitchen. Teri was standing on a potato now, teetering, trying to get enough height, and she was going to lose her balance if they didn't do something. "Okay, Bart, here's what we're going to do," said El, summoning all her resolve. "On the count of three, I'll distract that—the cockroach—and you run over and help Teri turn off the gas, okay? She can't reach the dials by herself. Then we'll all figure out the fire extinguisher together."

Bart didn't answer. His skin was clammy and pale.

El gave him a squeeze. "Okay?"

"Y-yeah." Bart gulped. "How're you gonna distract it?"

El looked around for inspiration. There was a metal skewer sticking out from under the fridge, half a mushroom on the floor to their left, and—

Without warning, the cockroach scuttled in their direction, and El shoved Bart toward the others. "Go now!"

Bart fled, and El grabbed the skewer from the ground and held it out like a jousting stick, aiming for the roach's disgustingly ugly face. The roach veered off slightly, and the sharp metal tip scratched along its armor without piercing it. The force of the roach's movement threw El off her feet, into the side of the fridge, and the beast turned and was coming for her again, at closer range now, its antenna and mandibles waving and God, she did not want that thing's mouth anywhere _near_ her—

There was the whine of a motor. "Elizabeth!"

"Neal?" The cockroach hesitated, but El didn't dare look away from it.

The motor was getting closer. "Stand up! Reach for me!"

El did, and a warm human hand closed around her arm and dragged her up and away, on an miniature green humvee. El huddled into Neal's arms, and the remote control went flying, but she didn't care. "Oh God. Thank you!"

There was a shout of triumph from across the kitchen. The stove was out.

 

 **4.**

"Do you think they've learned their lesson yet?" asked Mozzie, sitting in a cozy sonic bubble at the top of the Empire State Building. He poured June another mimosa.

She smiled and raised her glass to toast all the newly miniaturized denizens of the city. "I think we can give them another hour or so, don't you? After all, we are trying to break the habits of many lifetimes."

"True," said Mozzie, nodding. "Judging people by their stature is probably ingrained in their psyches. If we let them off too lightly, they'll never learn."

He was glad to have June as his ally in this. He probably wouldn't have gone through with it on his own, but she'd been marvelously sympathetic—being less than statuesque herself —and she'd even introduced him to Dr. Gortex, a rather avant-garde physicist who was very excited at the prospect of working with such an unusual diamond, not to mention Sorensen, a recent immigrant from Norway and now the second-best jewel thief in New York.

"Another game of Parcheesi?" asked June.

Mozzie took a handful of spiced almonds from the dish on the table. "Why not?"


End file.
